As an example of technology to reduce the operational burden on a vehicle driver, a vehicle control device has been known which makes a subject vehicle follow a preceding vehicle through automated control of vehicle speed or the like so as to keep the distance between the preceding vehicle and the subject vehicle constant (see, for example, Patent Literature 1).
An existing vehicle control device can switch over between vehicle travel control based on driver's driving operation such as example, accelerator pedal operation, brake pedal operation or the like and vehicle travel control based on automated control, according to the driver's turning on and off of a travel assistance switch for automated control. Also, when the driver expresses his/her willingness to control vehicle travel by operating an accelerator pedal or the like during automated control, the automated control is discontinued.